Beschreibung:

JONAH AND THE WHALE, in an initial 'E' on a leaf from the Chester Beatty Bible [southern, perhaps south-western, France, c.1300] A bright and quirky example of regional French illumination at the turn of the 13th century, this leaf comes from an imposing Bible once owned by the renowned bibliomaniac Sir Thomas Phillipps and then by the great Irish-American collector Alfred Chester Beatty. 302 x 229mm, ruled space: 225 x 145mm (9 x 5¾ in.), the recto with the end of the Book of Obadiah, and the Prologue, opening with an illuminated initial, and first chapter of the Book of Jonah opening with an historiated initial, the verso with three chapter numbers and initials with text-height penwork extensions in the margins, two columns of 40 lines written in black ink in a small gothic bookhand. Provenance : The parent Bible to which this leaf belonged was likely produced in a religious house – the regional style of the illumination rules out a Parisian atelier – and it remained in a monastic library until at least the 16th or 17th century: two inscriptions from this period by ‘Frere Jehan Mailhac’ and ‘Frater renatus faber bourdelois’ (i.e. ‘of Bordeaux’) suggest a south-western origin, consistent with the style of the illumination — Sir Thomas Phillipps (1792-1872), MS. 2506 (purchased from the bookseller Thorpe as part of a group, many of which came from the Iriarte, Santander and Astorga libraries) — Sir Alfred Chester Beatty (1875-1968), his manuscript MS.W.173, exhibited at Trinity College, Dublin, in 1955, no 9 (purchased privately from the Phillipps Collection in 1920; sold at his sale, Sotheby’s, 24 June 1969, lot 57). Chester Beatty also owned a second French manuscript Bible (his MS W.116), confusingly also dubbed the 'Chester Beatty Bible' —– probably thence to Alan Thomas (1911-1992), and after to Philip Duschnes, who broke it up.